Medilabsecure: A decade of One Health actions to prevent emerging vector-borne diseases in the Mediterranean, Sahel and Black Sea regions.

The scientific article summarizing the 10 years of the MedilabSecure network’s activities has been published in One Health Journal. Funded by the European Union under the Center of Excellence CBRN initiative, this program has been a pioneer in strengthening preparedness and response capacities to emerging vector-borne diseases in the Mediterranean basin, the Black Sea region, and the Sahel.

Following a “One Health” approach, the network achieved to bring together multidisciplinary experts in human health, animal health and medical entomology from more than 20 countries, favorizing a crucial collaboration in the fight against vector-borne diseases. The detection capacities of arboviruses (dengue, Zika, West Nile, etc.) and the identification, monitoring and control of vectors (mosquitos and ticks) have been overall improved in the countries benefiting from the project MedilabSecure network, as well as the epidemic risks assessment on a regional level. This success is based on a bottom-up approach that allowed to address the specific needs of each partner country, thus fostering a lasting relationship of trust and integrating monitoring surveillance.

MedilabSecure project laid a solid foundation for the new project in its continuity, OneHealthSecure, which aims to capitalize on the local empowerment to foster transfer of knowledge, trainings outputs and best practices to national authorities and contribute to leverage the political engagement for implementing a One Health approach in the beneficiary countries.

Read the article here.